He Lied About Death
by aaliyahcrosses
Summary: Because seeing nothing can also mean you can see everything.


**Words:** 866  
 **Type:** One-shot  
 **Warnings:** Mentions of torture(s), death(s), and fun stuff like that.  
 **A/N:** This wasn't edited properly. If you see any mistakes please kindly mention it on the review box below. Please put in a review if you have a time. It's always nice to know where I can possibly improve in my writing.

* * *

The first time she'd woken up since the accident, she _screamed_. There wasn't anything she could see. It was just dark. _Too_ dark. And she was so, _so_ scared.

But _he_ was there.

He was holding her hand, and he had spoken her name. Soothingly, apologetically.

It was times like this she remembers why she had fallen in love with him in the first place.

"Finally, Ai-chan's awake!"

 _And why she shouldn't._

She pulled her hand away from his hold. " _Don't_ ," she managed to choke out. Her voice was merely a rasp, a broken tone of a voice. She hated it.

"Alright," he replied, "alright." But she knew how he hated the sound of her voice too.

* * *

The doctor had told her how damaged her body was, and it turned out she could barely even remember what had happened. They said she was tortured. Physically, yes, but not just _that_. Because her eyes seemed to have no physical defects. It was her _mind_. She was tortured mentally and emotionally so much that her own brain decided it was tired and pushed _all_ her memories to where she couldn't find them, took off her sense of sight so she wouldn't see what was being done to her.

"How unlucky. I get to live," she told him, a week later when she could manage herself perfectly well inside her own hospital room.

He had _growled_ at her. He had always been so angry whenever she does that to herself.

"Never say that," he _almost_ shouted at her. "Haibara. You have to _live_."

She supposed it was because of the antidote. She didn't say it out loud, though.

And then she heard it from the echoes of her memories: him saying the exact same thing. It was ridiculous, but it's what she'd heard.

* * *

Every once in a while, they visit her. The people she considers her friends, and the people who befriended him and thought it their duty to visit her.

After Hattori Heiji and Toyama Kazuha visited, she'd asked Edogawa if he put the Osakan detective because of some misguided attempt to cheer her up. Before he even replied however, Ayumi, who was with the rest of Shounen Tantei in the room, burst out crying.

"Ai-chan! _Why_...? Why do you...?" The rest of her speech was unintelligible. She was speaking while sobbing and hiccuping.

Mitsuhiko and Genta decided to lead the crying girl out, with Mitsuhiko telling apologies, one after the other.

Ai asked, "aren't you gonna follow them?"

He sighed. "Would it do any good if I did?"

* * *

Agasa-hakase always visited her. He rarely ever came home. It was always the hospital, then science conventions.

But it was Conan who seemed like he almost never left her bedside. When she woke up, he was there. Before she slept, he was there. It was annoying... and endearing. Which left her annoyed even more because she's already head over heels for him! What more does he want?

"Ne, Hakase?" She called him as he was about to leave for his next convention. " _Please_ tell Kudo-kun to leave me alone."

There was a lapse of a few seconds before the professor replied. "I'll try, Ai-kun. I can't guarantee it though. It's Shinichi, after all."

"Yeah..." she sighed. "You're right."

* * *

It happened on a rainy day. It was an incredibly boring day, with Conan reading a book—Ai could hear the flipping of pages—when she heard Ayumi's voice from the outside.

"But we're lying to her!" she yelled, conflicted and no doubt, tearful.

The door slid open and she heard running over to her. And the Ayumi was hugging Ai. "I'm sorry, Ai-chan. I'm sorry. But _Conan-kun_. Conan-kun is _dead_. He isn't here. So please, _please_ stop talking like he's here."

* * *

She'd woken up with a throbbing headache, and what Ayumi had said was still ringing in her ears. She could hear motion though, so she thought she wasn't alone. Or she was, and she's just gone crazy.

"Ah! Ai-chan." It was Ran. "I'm sorry about Ayumi-chan and—"

"Is it true?" She interrupted her. "Is Edogawa-kun... dead?"

She didn't expect Ran to hug her like Ayumi did. She didn't expect Ran to cry. But she did too. Ai cried too.

* * *

Ran told her the story after that: how Conan and Ai were kidnapped, and how Ran tried to go after them. How it turned out that it was a bigger thing than Ran initially thought, and there were police and CIA and FBI, and Shinichi. How they'd manage to capture everyone but not able to locate Conan and Ai. How the boss did some last attempt to hide all the crimes and turned on a bomb that would destroy the place, how Shinichi entered the place despite warnings not to. How he managed to throw Ai wrapped in a blanket, but never quite managed to save Conan and himself.

Later that night, she dreamt of it. And it was a nightmare.

And when she opened her eyes in the morning, she could see again. But never him. She could never see him again. The ghost or an illusion—she's never quite sure—of the boy she loved.


End file.
